Dear Reader,
All this week I am attending a writing workshop in Berkeley, Calif., in the morning and writing the column in the afternoon. I'm not sure if that will have any effect on the column. It just feels weird and different. Let me know. Plus I'm driving across the Bay Bridge in the truck every day. I was going to take BART, but then I drove the first day because I didn't know how long it would take to walk from BART. And then I got caught for parking in the lot without a sticker and bought a $20 parking sticker for the week, so now if I take BART that's $20 for parking down the drain. But I save the $4 toll on the bridge. But BART takes longer. But I can write on BART. But if I drive I can listen to Noel McLaughlin sing Irish songs. I can sing in the truck. I can't sing on BART. I don't know why I'm telling you this. I'm compulsively disclosing again. Bad habit. Need to work on that.
Dear Cary,
The third relationship in a row has ended because the man I was dating suddenly decided he wants children of his own. I'm 47 and the men were about my age. All said at the start they wanted a serious, long-term relationship, then Boom! They love me but I'm too old.
I'm not alone. You'd need a statistician to count the attractive, interesting, single women of a certain age who have been dumped for breeders.
I'm not talking about a clutch of pathetic broads sitting in a bar swilling cheap white wine and whining. We all go out on our own, do things we're interested in and keep a sense of humor about it all. But when you do all that and see the slop computer matching comes up with, and are kind and polite when your 50-year-old ex introduces you to his 27-year-old wife and their new baby, it's safer to stay at home and watch Bette Davis movies.
I've never lied about my age, and unless there's some way -- that only men know about -- to bend the space-time continuum, men are aging at the same rate women age. So what's with the baby wishes? Is it a cover for fear of commitment or are they just selfish?
I'm leaning toward selfish. My theory is that men of my generation have just had everything given to them. They grew up with at-home moms who took care of them. They came of sexual age before AIDS, when women were becoming independent, sex wasn't evil anymore and being unmarried but living together was OK, so they didn't need to commit. They got good jobs, they had independence plus relationships, and now they want to be young again, and with a young wife and children. They can be at 50 what they might have been at 30, only with money and a convenient excuse, age, for not meeting some of the more energetic requirements of parenthood.
I'm trying not to go from anger to fury. OK, I'm already way past fury -- from sadness over another breakup to despair over never finding a romantic partner. How can I keep being optimistic despite disappointment after disappointment?
Thinking Men Are Spoiled
Dear Thinking,
Your theory about men is certainly interesting.
If you had a good title -- some kind of "syndrome," perhaps, like the "Combover Syndrome," or maybe "The Pot-Bellied Peter Pan," you could do a book. Maybe you should. It might sell.
But whether your theory is true or false you're still a modern person in the modern world and you have to make choices and look out for yourself and not let people fuck with you.
So let us look at the simple truth. You had a series of disappointing experiences with men. You were hurt. You feel bad. You are trying not to go from anger to fury to sadness to despair. You want to keep your optimism.
I wonder why you want to keep your optimism. This optimism seems dangerous.
Why do you want to keep it? Of what value is it to you? Is it a shield from a bleaker view? Is it a bulwark against a bottomless despair?
See, I have my own suspicion that sometimes what we call optimism is more like a suicidal, willful naiveté, and that rather than shielding us from despair it leads us there. I haven't worked this all out in my head, you understand, but something tells me that optimism is not your friend.
So what if you were not optimistic? Could you continue to date men? What if you continued to date men but assumed that every man you dated was an inveterate selfish bullshitter?
I guess maybe that would ruin it. OK, how about this: How about you continue to date but instead of optimism you carry with you a wise, careful, self-protective wariness and skepticism, perhaps paired with an inner certainty that you don't need a damned fucking thing from any man. Nothing. You don't need nothing from no man. Like the fish needs the bicycle, OK? You're inert, self-contained, wary, observing, amused, detached. And you just pay attention to what you're feeling. When your bullshit detector goes off you excuse yourself like you're getting a phone call. And you quickly try to figure out what the fuck is going on. What do your instincts tell you? Are you being bullshitted again? Are you giving in to a wish, some wish that comes from someplace where wishes are never granted?
Your theory could be right or wrong. Certainly the historical conditions are there. But I'm not into making sweeping generalizations about men. You've still got the problem of personal choice. If certain patterns are repeating in your own life, then you are wise to look into what you are doing. You have to investigate it. You have to protect yourself. You have to stay away from men who do this to you.
What? You want more?
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